Kristin Shoemaker blogs at OStatic and Linux Librarian. She likes to take things apart and see if she can put them back together again in new and better ways.

Della had a Lifestyle Change

Earlier this month, Brad kindly asked me what I thought about Dell’s “Della” site, a marketing campaign that was presumably designed to help women decide if a Dell Mini Netbook was right for them. For those disinclined to click back in time to read the ramblings of a woman who loves small keyboards but looks sickly in pink, here’s the abridged version:

Netbooks shouldn’t be a hard sell to this demographic. And just because your customer base might not be interested in what makes a netbook work, it doesn’t mean they are unable to figure out the ways they could personally use one — and please, don’t ever assume your customers are morons.

I wasn’t the only one who felt that way (by a long shot).  It wasn’t too long before Dell pulled down and revamped the “Della” site.  That’s a good thing, of course — listening to your customers (and potential customers) is always positive. There’s not a whole lot any company can do in two weeks to revise a major marketing effort, no matter how many copywriters and web designers it has chained within the razorwire covered walls of  its cubicle farms.

So here’s what happened.  “Della” disappeared in a puff of smoke (or with a deftly executed rm -rf /della command) and was replaced with an eerily similar Dell Lifestyle portal.  Yes, the copy is not so egregiously condescending (nor is it terribly enlightening).  The blatant overtones of  “Look, netbooks are good for womenfolk!” have been removed or at least been made more subtle.  And that just leaves me wondering why this campaign was launched at all.  Dell sells computers, and that’s what the Lifestyle-no-longer-Della site does — but so does the rest of the site. There’s just very little offered here. It’s not patronizing, but it’s not necessary in its current state, either.

[Via Andi Wang's post at Gizmodo, which mysteriously only shows in Google Reader,  and ultimately via RegHardware]

Kristin Shoemaker blogs at OStatic and Linux Librarian. She likes to take things apart and see if she can put them back together again in new and better ways. And she’s not impressed with Dell’s latest attempts to market netbooks toward women.

Dell seems to have gotten itself in a gender bender. Fine, that’s a bad play on words, but so is re-coloring your netbook models and adding a trailing “a” to your company’s name to make your products  more appealing to women.

Actually, that’s not entirely true. I suppose I have to make this criticism a little more constructive by pointing out something vaguely positive about the Della-branded Inspiron Minis. They aren’t simply pink (but purchasing a pink model will get the very worthy Susan G. Komen Foundation a $5 donation), and the adhesive overlays are reasonably okay looking. And I suppose that some tech gadgets are  harder to sell to at least some women, and highlighting appealing aspects to a particular customer base is expected and appropriate.

I’m willing to bet a fair amount of legal tender that netbooks aren’t a hard gadget to sell to women. But whether you’re a woman who is very technically inclined, or one who wants a neat, compact little gadget that’s heftier than a cell and could care less about the technical stuff — you’re probably not going to take kindly to being simultaneously target marketed and stereotyped.

I’m not quite as put off by the “cute” references as Nicole Price Fasig over at Gearlog, because netbooks are kind of cute. I’m also the kind of woman who finds flexible ratcheting screwdrivers and extra long SATA cabling totally delightful, so perhaps my definition of “cute” is skewed.  Fasig is spot-on about the overall tone the Della site conveys.

In fact, one of her major sticking points was one of mine, as well. The Della home page beckoned  me to click the topic labeled “Tech Tips.” (How could I resist? C’mon!)  “Tech Tips” helpfully details  seven absolutely shocking ways that a netbook could change my life.  I can read books on it, and manage my schedule on it, much the same way I do with my big, ugly, testosterone-oozing desktop computer.  That’s not the cringe-worthy part, though.  Hold on, girlfriends — I can also manage my diet and weight loss program, find recipes and use my Mini as a “meditation buddy.”  Somebody in Dell’s marketing department seriously pitched to a group of non-marketing colleagues, “We can say it’s a great ‘meditation buddy’ and tell these women to schedule times for yoga and meditation exercises in ‘Remember the Milk‘ or Google Calendar!”  Those non-marketing colleagues then said, “That’s a great idea!”

Are any of those people women? Have any of them ever talked to women? Seen women? Was there a focus group involved — consisting of women?

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